Product Description
SEE MORE EUROPEAN NEOLITHIC ARTIFACTS
With the epic proportions of an earlier period Mousterian hand axe, this massive CONVERGENT UNIFACIAL SCRAPER is the single largest and most impressive European Neolithic flake tool we have yet to offer or handle. It was found on the tiny 320 acre island of Sio, of the Funen Archipelago of Denmark. This supreme quality genuine flake scraper was collected from an Early Neolithic Period settlement site once inhabited by people of the Funnel-Necked Beaker Pottery Culture of Northern Europe. It was masterfully flaked of flint and utilized between 6000 and 5400 years ago. This FINEST GRADE example is still in its original form as originally made.
Original ground minerals and sediment are still intact in hinge fractures - an indicator ONLY seen in AUTHENTIC specimens. This Neolithic artifact is a supreme example of the workmanship of a skilled tool maker from the earliest of north Europe's farming society. Genuine tools from the Funnel-Necked Beaker Pottery Culture are seldom available for public sale and represent an excellent opportunity to acquire a genuine stone tool artifact from some of the world's first farming peoples!
HISTORY
The earliest food-producing communities of Northern Europe belonged to the Funnel-Necked Beaker Pottery Culture. This culture existed from 6200 to 4800 years ago in the Northern-most European region. The pottery produced by these earliest farmers had a distinctive necked design. The first use of the PLOW, ANIMAL TRACTION and WHEELED TRANSPORT in north-central Europe is attributed to this Neolithic culture. Megalithic chambered tombs were employed and built into long mounds. These mounds made by the Funnel-Necked Beaker peoples still stand today in many parts of north Europe.
Farming in northern and central Europe differed from that of the more temperate southern regions of Europe, the Middle East and north Africa. The harsh winters required crops to be sown in the Spring as opposed to the Fall for the latter. Woodland grazing in the north meant more emphasis on the raising of cattle and pigs compared to the herds of sheep and goats popular in the south.
Neolithic settlements were typically small in population with only about forty to sixty people. The wooden longhouse was the main type of building which housed both people and their livestock. Postholes are all that remain today leaving burials and ritual stone structures as the only remnants of this period. Neolithic burials were either individual or communal. The communal burials were housed in large megalithic structures which were then covered with earth creating a giant mound. Offerings of stone tools, pottery and ornaments were often included in burials.